Not my favorite work, but . . . hopefully it's still fun. :D
"We'll have to work the puzzle, of course," Quinlan finished, flourishing the box in one hand. "But overall, I'd say our stakeout was successful."
"Wait. . ." Hunter looked a bit confused. "You're saying we have to work this because you bought it even though you didn't want it?"
Quinlan squinted an eye closed. "No? I mean – sort of. I didn't want it, but I had to buy it."
"Why?"
"The storeowner was getting suspicious. I had to buy something."
Tech materialized next to him and tapped the cardboard box. "Yes, but there was a vast selection of wares you could have purchased. Why this in particular?"
"Because I'd been standing in the game section for ten minutes, and it was the cheapest thing there."
There was a long silence, broken only by the faint beep of Tech's datapad as it finished compiling – whatever it was he was compiling.
A toothpick hit the far wall. "Right," said Crosshair. "And it's served its purpose. So get rid of it."
Quinlan turned indignantly to face him. "It's a perfectly good puzzle."
Hunter glanced around the crowded cockpit. "Maybe, but fifteen hundred pieces?"
"Should take us all of an hour to put together," Quinlan told him.
Hmm . . . on second thought, that was a pretty optimistic statement . . . Very optimistic . . . Actually, no, it was unrealistic . . . As in, really unrealistic at best . . .
Okay, fine, it was a bald-faced and unintentional lie. On his own, it took him about eight hours to do a one-thousand piece puzzle – and that was on a design with lots of different colors. He wondered if he should correct his statement.
Wrecker took the box from him and shook it. "Well – I'll try it. Never done one of these before."
"Wait!" said Tech. "What are the dimensions?"
"Thirty-two by twenty-four inches."
"Good. We can use the galley table, then."
Quinlan shrugged his agreement, took the box back from Wrecker, and went into the galley. The others followed, gathering around the table as though they were attending a mission briefing.
"So," said Hunter. "How does this work?"
Quinlan raised an eyebrow. "Please tell me you've seen a puzzle before."
The four commandos shot him looks containing various levels of skepticism.
"We were in the store with you," Crosshair reminded him.
"Yeah, but you spent the whole time watching the street," Quinlan said, drawing his knife and cutting open the box.
Crosshair sniffed. "Not the whole time."
Hunter cleared his throat. "Vos, I was asking whether there is a particular way to put puzzles together."
Quinlan pulled off the cover and dumped the pieces on the table. "Well, the edge is the easiest to work, so people usually start with that."
"Ah, I see," said Tech, picking up a piece. "Only the outer pieces have a flat side."
"Right." Quinlan picked up the puzzle cover and stared at it. "I don't know – this might take longer than I thought. There's a lot of black in this picture."
"Yeah," said Hunter, looking from the pile of pieces to the cover. "Vos, why would you get a puzzle of a city at night?"
"The tourist shop didn't have much of a selection. My choices were either 'Night over Theed' or an artistic but inaccurate rendering of the Gungans' underwater city, or a painting of the very boring Naboo landscape." He looked up from sorting pieces to see that Tech and Hunter were staring at him. "What?"
Hunter took a handful of pieces and started poking through them. "I didn't realize you'd actually put thought into it."
Quinlan decided to be magnanimous and not reply.
Everyone was silent for a few minutes, busy trying to locate the pieces with the flat edges.
"Hey, Wrecker," Hunter said suddenly. "Would you sit down? I'm getting a crick in my back just looking at you."
Wrecker shrugged and complied, jostling Tech as he did so. Tech dropped three of the pieces, yelped, and dove under the table to retrieve them.
"Sorry," said Wrecker. "Wait – this piece has two flat edges."
"Good," said Quinlan. "Give. I found the other three already."
Tech reappeared and snatched the piece out of Wrecker's outstretched hand. "That is the only corner piece that has green in it. Therefore, it goes here."
He clicked it into place.
The other three commandos leaned over to look at it, and Quinlan realized Tech had been piecing together the green part of the border all along. "Hey, I think I can connect my part."
With some finagling and many cautionary uses of "Watch out!" and "Don't knock those pieces off!" they managed.
Crosshair, who had been motionless for nearly a minute as he gazed intently at the pile of flat pieces in front of him, suddenly moved. Within thirty seconds, he'd added all of his pieces to Tech and Quinlan's section of the puzzle.
After Hunter and Wrecker each added a few pieces, the frame was done.
"Right," said Hunter, observing the frame with a satisfied nod. "Now what?"
Quinlan flicked a strand of hair out of his eyes. "Uh – now we finish it?"
"Presumably, that would be the idea," Hunter said, giving him a sarcastic look.
"We could sort the remaining pieces by color," suggested Tech. "The city is made up of mostly greys and yellows, because of how the artist rendered the lighting; it would be easiest to put that together first, as the sky is nearly all black. The sky will, of course, be the most difficult to put together."
"Wait," said Crosshair, peering closely at the cover. "There are people there."
Everyone crowded over to look.
"You're right," said Tech. "Hm. . . this cover is not well-made. Everything is blurred."
"Well – the picture is a lot bigger on the puzzle than it is on the cover," Hunter said thoughtfully. "The people will be easier to see on the pieces themselves."
"I'll do this group," Wrecker offered, jabbing at the cover. "Looks like a family out for a walk, and they're all wearing orange. Won't be too hard."
"Those are the royal handmaidens, actually," Tech said after a moment. "While you work on them, I will attempt to locate the Nabooian guardsmen."
"I'll find the rest of the civilians," said Crosshair.
"Sounds like a plan," said Hunter. "Vos, you and I will sort the rest of the pieces by color. Pieces of the sky go in the box, the city can stay on the table."
They set briskly to work. A silent half hour passed, broken only by a brief scuffle that occurred when Wrecker tried to put together a guardsman instead of letting Tech do it.
The chronometer chimed, and everyone ignored it.
A few minutes later, Tech straightened. "That is the last guardsman. Now all we have to do is position them properly around the entrance to the castle."
"I've got the city right here," said Quinlan, who had long ago finished sorting. "Not sure how much of it's the castle, though."
"We will have to use a process of elimination," Tech informed him. "The captain of the guard is missing his hand. Logically, it would follow that his hand is on a piece of the castle itself. I will attempt to locate it."
He pulled out his datapad and started running scans.
Wrecker finished the group of handmaidens. "These go in the center," he said, positioning them in the frame.
Crosshair swiped the cover of the box, glancing from it to the frame, and then set to work situating every tiny person he had found where they belonged.
"You could just wait to do that," Quinlan said. "I mean, they're not connected to anything else yet."
Crosshair shot him a look and returned to his work.
Hunter had found that part of the sky was a shade lighter than the rest, due to the city lights, and he was nearly done piecing that section together.
"Okay," Quinlan said. "Guess I'm working on the city, then."
Some time later, Quinlan got up and stretched. "Guys?"
"Quiet," Wrecker grumbled, turning two pieces around and around. "I'm trying to finish this store."
"Just saying – it's pretty late."
Hunter glanced at the chrono, performed a slight double-take, stood up, and ordered everyone to get some sleep.
They all stared at him as though readjusting their mental focus. Then Crosshair's gaze slid to the chronometer, and he blinked once. "Twenty-three hundred?"
"That's impossible," decided Tech, without looking at the time. "Besides, we're nearly done."
Wrecker shrugged, taking him at his word, and went back to work.
"We are nearly done," Crosshair agreed, glancing down at the pieces he'd just been working on.
Yeah, sure, if getting just over half the puzzle counts as nearly done . . .
Hunter shot Quinlan a vaguely resentful look.
Quinlan smirked. It wasn't his fault that Hunter's teammates seemed to have a bad habit of not listening.
Hunter sighed loudly, marched over to the control panel, and shut off the lights with a decisive push of a button.
Quinlan left cheerfully enough. It was his turn on guard duty, anyway. He went into the cockpit and shut the door, then sat sideways in the pilot's seat, listening to the mild chaos that had broken out.
Early the next morning, the team reconvened in the galley. They ate standing, made sure the ship was in order, and returned to the puzzle.
Hours passed. The team worked steadily, silently, and efficiently towards completing the jigsaw puzzle.
There were perhaps one hundred pieces left when the spell of silence was broken.
Crosshair reached for one of Wrecker's pieces, and Wrecker pinned his wrist to the table. "I got this one," he growled. "Do your own part of it."
The sniper reached over with the opposite hand, snatched a piece, and clicked it into place. Wrecker slapped a hand on the table and stood, towering over him.
Hunter kicked Wrecker in the knee, making him sit back down, and said, "If you two ruin the puzzle now, you're on guard duty for the week."
While they were still focused on him, Tech filched about a dozen of Hunter's puzzle pieces, then a few of Wrecker's for good measure.
Quinlan leaned closer to him and held out a hand. Tech slipped him a few pieces.
"Fine," Wrecker was grumbling. "Wait . . . Hey! Where'd the rest of that statue go!"
"Which statue?" said Tech, gesturing to the puzzle box cover. "There are twelve."
For a moment, Quinlan thought that Wrecker would fall for the ruse, but instead he turned and stared at Tech. Then at Quinlan. Then at Tech.
"YOU TOOK THEM!" he roared suddenly. "Give 'em back!"
"No," said Tech primly.
Wrecker lunged across the table at him.
Tech scrambled to stand on the bench, then put a hand on Hunter's shoulder and vaulted over the sergeant to land beside Crosshair.
Wrecker snatched up the pieces that Tech had left behind, then sat down again, putting them into place while he kept one eye on Tech.
Quinlan held up the pieces Tech had given him and raised an eyebrow. Crosshair nudged Tech and gestured. Hunter glanced between them and the Jedi, then gave Quinlan a darkly warning look.
Quinlan grinned and slid around to his side of the bench, leaning across to hand the pieces to the sniper. As he sat back, he swiped some of Hunter's pieces.
Hunter didn't even look at him. Instead, he drew his vibroblade and pinned Quinlan's half-cape to the wall behind him.
Everyone looked up at the sound of metal on metal.
"We're switching places," Hunter said, sliding out. "Wrecker, move over."
He sat down beside Wrecker, and Crosshair and Tech slipped in next to Quinlan, who was struggling to remove the knife without tearing his cape.
"We're nearly done!" Wrecker said excitedly.
"Give me a hand here," whispered Quinlan to Tech.
Tech gave the knife a tug, then twisted around on his knees and pulled harder. The knife came out suddenly, and he jolted backwards into the table, his elbow hitting the puzzle.
Everyone observed the damage in alarm – but it wasn't too bad. Only a few pieces had been knocked out of place.
Crosshair and Tech fixed it, then glanced at Quinlan, who had just put his last piece in. There were a couple dozen more pieces of the sky, which Hunter and Wrecker were carefully working on, but they were all on the opposite side of the table.
Tech fidgeted impatiently, then said, "No, Hunter, it goes there."
"Shh." Hunter was absolutely focused.
Tech slouched back with a huff.
Crosshair toyed with a toothpick, then cast Quinlan a sideways look.
Quinlan raised an eyebrow. "What?"
"You're the Jedi."
Tech brightened. Hunter looked up in alarm. Wrecker planted both forearms on whatever pieces he could reach. Crosshair smirked.
Quinlan focused – reached out with the Force – and floated a dozen pieces into the air and over to his side of the table.
"Thank you," Tech said, taking the pieces with a supercilious look at Hunter. He handed some to Crosshair and Quinlan.
The two groups at either side of the table glared at each other.
Wrecker carefully slid half his pieces to Hunter, still glowering at the others.
The mutual stare down lasted for perhaps fifteen seconds, and then everyone burst into action, clicking pieces into place as fast as they could.
The only problem was, they were all working on the same area. Crosshair accidentally smacked Hunter in the nose when he moved forward too fast. Wrecker caught Quinlan by the arm and shoved him back hard. Tech used his hand to prevent Hunter from placing a piece. Hunter got to one knee on the bench and grabbed the slicer's wrist, flinging him back into his seat.
He landed against Quinlan, who fell sideways into Crosshair, and by the time they'd gotten upright, Wrecker had gotten his last piece in. Crosshair and Quinlan were also out of pieces. It was down to Tech and Hunter.
Hunter glanced at Wrecker. "Take down his support."
Wrecker lunged to his feet, and Crosshair and Quinlan dove to either side in a desperate bid for escape.
Wrecker caught them both anyway and got an arm around each of them, hauling them upright.
"Put me down!" snapped Crosshair.
"Nope."
"I don't suppose the 'I'm a general' line would work," Quinlan offered.
"Nope."
Tech and Hunter were working at top speed, ignoring each other except for brief skirmishes when one or the other's hand got in the way. Five pieces left – four, three –
"Done!" they shouted together.
"No, you're not . . ." Quinlan glanced at the empty spot in the picture. "Look. That house is missing a window."
Hunter got to his feet. "Who has the last piece?"
Everyone looked honestly confused. Wrecker released Crosshair and Quinlan and joined Tech in searching the room. No luck. The piece was nowhere in sight.
"Okay," said Tech, taking a breath as though to calm himself. "Where could it be, logically? We worked here last night, and then – Quinlan, you went to the cockpit, and we were in the barracks."
"Everyone, spread out!" ordered Hunter.
They scrambled to obey. It took nearly ten minutes of increasingly frantic searching, but eventually Wrecker found it on the top galley shelf.
"How'd it end up way up there?" Quinlan asked as everyone gathered around the puzzle.
"Must have been during the fight," Crosshair said.
"Which one?" Hunter asked with an amused look.
"Least we found it," Wrecker shrugged. "Okay – I'm putting it in."
The moment the puzzle was complete, the tension vanished from the room, and everyone stared down at the picture in satisfaction.
Quinlan grinned, then looked up to see Hunter watching him.
"One hour," Hunter said with a sarcastic tilt of his head. "That was more like nine hours, Vos."
The Jedi thought for a moment. "I think your chronometer's just broken."
I don't know why, but one of my absolute favorite 'Tech expressions' is the one he pulls when Saw Gerrera says something like, "I thought you were supposed to be the smart one." :D No, that didn't really have much to do with the story . . . Just thought I'd mention it.